Food processing operations typically package products such as potato chips, corn chips, pretzels, etc., in product bags of various sizes ranging from individual serving portions to commercial establishment multiple serving-sized portions. In the art, small bags are typically 4 to 6 inches in height, medium bags 6 to 10 inches in height, large bags 10 to 13 inches in height, and extra large bags 13 to 18 inches in height. The product bags have varying width within each size range depending on the density of the product contained therein. For example, corn chips are more dense than potato chips and pretzels are more dense than corn chips, therefore product bags containing potato chips are wider that those containing corn chips, which in turn are wider than those containing pretzels.
In order to expedite the packaging of individually bagged food products such as potato chips, corn chips, pretzels, etc., into shipping cartons, it is desirable to have the bagged food products in a vertically oriented array. Vertical orienting of bagged food products, known in the art as collating, allows for efficient transition of the bagged food product into shipping cartons. Formerly, the process of gathering the bagged food products from conveyors and transferring them into shipping cartons was a tedious and time consuming labor intensive task. The bagged food products were randomly spaced and horizontally positioned on the conveyor making it difficult to transfer the individually bagged food products from the conveyor into the shipping cartons.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,356,906 issued Nov. 2, 1982 to David M. Fallas, discloses a prior art collator that advanced the art and assisted in gathering and arranging food product bags on a conveyor for transport into shipping cartons. U.S. Pat. Nos. 5,495,932 and 5,615,762, both issued to William B. Dyess and assigned to the Assignee of the present application disclose a conveyor apparatus for collating bag products that uses a bar to engage the packaged food products as they fall from the end of a first inclined conveyor onto a second horizontal conveyor. The bar has a friction enhancing covering surface which aids in pivoting the bagged food products as they fall, thereby properly collating the array of bagged food products. In the aforementioned Dyess collator, the position of the product engaging bar is manually adjustable.
Other prior art collators are known in the industry. One such collator includes a first conveyor having a rotatable discharge drum positioned at the end of an inclined conveyor and comprising a plurality of rotating disks. An air nozzle is adjustably positioned between the rotating disks of the drum. As a bagged food product is discharged over the rotating discharge drum of the inclined conveyor, a blast of air is ejected from the nozzle which strikes the falling product bag and assists in uprighting the bag on a receiving conveyor positioned below the discharge drum of the inclined conveyor. In the prior art collator, the air nozzle must be manually adjusted up or down to properly position the air blast relative to bags of varying product heights. Additionally, the pressure of the air blast must be adjusted manually to take into account the density of the product in the bag.
A need exists for a collator having pre-programmable adjustments based on product bag size and product density thereby eliminating the need for manual adjustment of the collating apparatus. A further need exists for a collating apparatus wherein the operator may adjust the collator while the collator is in operation (i.e., "on the fly").
The present invention includes a discharge conveyor having a rotatable drum position at its discharge end. The rotatable drum is comprised of a plurality of disks. Two pairs of air nozzles are positioned between the rotating disks of the rotatable drum. A receiving conveyor is positioned below the discharge end of the first conveyor. Bagged food products move along the discharge conveyor and are discharged over the rotating drum thereof onto the first conveyor. As each product bag falls toward the receiving conveyor, air blasts assist in uprighting, i.e., collating the product bag. A sensor indicates when the product bag is properly positioned to receive the air blasts for uprighting the bag. The present invention further includes a programmable logic controller ("PLC") which controls the speed and incremental movement of the conveyors, as well as the air pressure and the air blast duration required to effect collating.
A second embodiment of the invention includes a counter which records the number of bags moving through the collator. The counter can be used to activate the receiving conveyor to effect spacing between groups of bags. Alternatively, the counter can be used to activate a diverter mounted at the discharge end of the receiving conveyor which directs a preselected number of bags into each of a plurality of cartons.